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The Committee for the International Exposition 
OF 1892, OF THE City of New York. 



COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION. 

Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, Chairman. Hon. William C. Whitney, Vice-Chairman. 

William E. D. Stokes, Secretary. 



AN ADDRESS TO 



THE PEOPLE OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 

ON THE 

Best Location for the Exposition of 1892, 

28TH NOVEMBER, 1889. 



The Letter of W. E. D. Stokes, Secretary of the 
Committee on Legislation, to the Chamber of Com- 
merce AND Industry of Louisiana, at New Orleans, 
at their Meeting on the 13th November, 1889. 

An article from the Cosmopolitan Magazine for 
December, 1889, by Hon. Wm. Waldorf Astor, 
Vice-Chairman of the Committee on Site and Build- 
ings, Ex U. S. Minister to Italy, " New York's 
Candidacy for the World's Fair of 1892," in 
answer to Senator Farwell's argument for Chicago 
in that Magazine for November, and 

The Letters of W. E, D. Stokes, Secretary, to Hon. 
Herbert W. Ladd, Governor of Rhode Island, read 
at the Meetings of the Board of Trade of Providence, 
R. I., on the 7th and 15th October, 1889, and their 
action thereon. 



DOUGLAS TAYLOR, PRINTER, NEW YORK. 



x^^'^ 



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The Committee for the International Exposition 
of 1892. 



Hon. Hugh J. Grant, Mayor, 

Chairman. 



W. McM. Speer, 

Secretary. 



Committee on Legislation. 

Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, Chairman. Hon. Wm. C. Whitney, Vice-Chairmem. 
William E. D. Stokes, Secretary. 



Edward H. Ammidown. 
Daniel F. Appleton. 
Hon. John C. Calhoun. 
Francis W. Cheney. 
Hon. Alonzo B. Cornell. 
Hon. Chauncey M. Depew. 
Hon. Franklin Edson. 
Hon. Joel B. Erhardt. - 
Hon. Wm. M. Evarts. 
Hon. Hamilton Fish. 
Hon. Abram S. Hewitt. 
Hon. James W. Husted. 
Hon. 



Wm. 



Joseph Liebmann. 
William R. Mayer. 
Herman S. Mendelson. 
Hon. Warner Miller. 
Hon. Levi P. Morton. - 
Hon. Thomas C. Platt. 
Hon. Elihu Root. 
Gen. Wm. T. Sherman. 
Ambrose Snow. 
Wm. E. D. Stokes. 
James W. Tappin. 
Francis B. Thurber. 
C. Whitney. 



Executive Committee : The Chairman, Vice-Chairman, Secretary, Messrs. 
Calhoun, Cornell, Hewitt, Miller, Platt, Root, Thurber. 



W. E. D. Stokes, Secretary., 146 Broadway, N. Y. 



The Committee foe the International Exposition of 

1892. 



COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION. 

Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, Cliairman. Hon. William C. Whitney, Vice-Chairman. 

William E. D. Stokes, Secretary. 



New York, 146 Broadway, 
28tli November, 1889. 

To tJte People of tlie United States of America : 

There have been three public meetings at which an 
opinion has been asked for in respect to the best location 
for the Exposition of 1892. Washington, the Capital of 
the Country; New York, its Chief City and Seaport, and 
Chicago and St. Louis, its two great central cities have 
each had advocates, though in the meetings spoken of the 
contest was between New York and Chicago. In each of 
these meetings, Chicago had solicited beforehand the con- 
sideration of the question, and spent weeks on the ground 
in obtaining pledges before the meetings were called. 

The meeting at Providence, Rhode Island, on the 8th 
and 15th October, 1889, was presided over by Governor 
Herbert W. Ladd. It was held by the Board of Trade of 
Providence and included representatives from all parts of 
the State. Chicago sent her most eloquent advocate and 
leading citizen, Hon. Thomas B. Bryan, but the decision 
was in favor of New York, after a discussion extending 
through the two meetings. 

The meeting at New Orleans was of the Chamber of Com- 
merce and Industry of Louisiana on the 31st October, 1889. 
After a long discussion the meeting adjourned until the 



13tli November. At this meeting, tliough the membership 
of the Chamber was 400, but 75 attended, and the vote in 
favor of Chicago prevailed by a majority of five. As this 
result was opposed to the views of the officers, the Execu- 
tive Committee and leading members of the Chamber, it is 
proper to state that it was brought about by the managers, 
solicitors and agents of the Illinois Central Railroad and 
the Pullman Car Company, who came from Chicago and 
"crowded" the meeting. By these means, as well as by 
the efforts of the business men of Chicago, with their corre- 
spondents at New Orleans, who had been working for many 
weeks and obtaining pledges of votes in advance of the 
arguments, the result was obtained. Colonel John C. 
"Wickliife writes us that it cannot be looked upon as an im- 
partial expression of opinion by the Crescent City. 

The meeting at Milwaukee was an annual meeting of the 
" International Association of Fairs and Expositions," on 
the 13th and 14th November. The close relations of Mil- 
waukee with Chicago forbade any other result than a vote for 
that location. "A committee of four ladies from Chicago 
spoke eloquently for that City," while the argument from 
New York was not even presented. 

On each of these occasions, as well as at many similar 
meetings which received less public attention, the officers 
of the Exposition Committee in this City determined not 
to follow the methods of Chicago, but to leave the decision 
to the free judgment of the citizens of the locality. They 
sent their printed arguments to the meeting, and trusted 
to the voluntary advocacy of those who favored New York 
among their own fellow-citizens. 

These arg-uments have been printed and are contained in 
this pamphlet. They have in the circulation which have 
been given to them elicited so many responses that the 
Committee have determined to spread them more widely 
throughout the country so that the reasons in favor of 
New York may have their just weight in the deliberate 



judgment of the people. We ask no pledges or promises 
and make no appeal to local prejudices. 

To the New Orleans meeting on the 13th November were 
sent telegrams from Gfovernor Hill, ex-President Cleveland, 
General Sherman, Chauncey M. Depew, ex-Senator Thomas 
C. Piatt, Roswell P. Flower, Erastus Wiman, Francis B. 
Thurber and others of the bankers and merchants of this 
city. 

Mr. Depew' s telegram, which follows, expresses well the 
New York sentiment. 

To tfie Cliamher of Commerce and Industry of Louisiana, 
New Orleans ; 

Mr. Stokes, of our Committee, has prepared and sent 
you an argument which I trust will be read and to it I beg 
to add : That New York is the Metropolis of the North 
American Continent is undisputed. If a World's Fair for 
England was held in Manchester or Birmingham, for 
France in Lyons, for Italy in Venice, it would be local and 
National. The world would recognize it as International 
only at London or Paris or Rome. 

New York has selected the site, will raise the money, has 
the accommodations and is the one city which all Ameri- 
cans as well as all foreigners would select to visit, if limited 
in their travels to one great centre, and New York wants 
the Fair. 

New York has more Southerners than almost any city 
of the South. More Western men than almost any city 
of the West. More Yankees than Boston. More Irish 
than Dublin. More Germans than any city in Germany, 
outside of Berlin. New York and London are the cosmo- 
politan centres of the world. Other cities argue that the 
Fair will help them and their tributary territory. New 
York recognizes the growth, greatness and vigor of Chicago 
and St. Louis, and would cheerfully join in National or In- 
ternational Exhibitions for their benefit, but it is submit- 
ted that an exhibit of the world's progress and develop- 
ment which, to be a fitting celebration of the four hun- 
dredth anniversary of the discovery of America by Colum- 
bus, must surpass all previous displays of arts and indus- 



tries, cannot be a subject for local competitions. It must 
begin where its International character will be understood 
by all the governments of the earth and where the whole 
Country will share in the benefits of its surprising success. 

Chaujstcet M. Depew. 



Ex-Senator Piatt telegraphed : 

To Col. John C. Wickliffe, 

New Orleans, La. 

If the Fair is to be International New York is the only 
place where it can be held. I am sure that the merchants 
of New Orleans — the second port of the country — will 
support New York; for we are in earnest in securing the 
location. 

Thomas C. Platt. 

New York looks at the Exposition in its serious aspects. 
We do not follow Chicago in planning a great business 
advertisement and a great speculation by the aid of the 
United States Government, for a boom in property and in 
business, in which poor men are to have plenty of work 
with high pay, and every boarding-house keeper is to reap 
a huge harvest and become a millionaire. Nor do we bring 
the question into politics and trade votes for Congressmen 
who will favor us; nor do we seek by personal and busi- 
ness solicitations to obtain pledges and promises of the 
votes in Congress which will decide the location. 

Nor does New York issue ten- dollar subscription notes 
and sell them through the shops and the streets for twenty 
cents each, or give them away and then count them up at 
their face value as cash subscriptions, when in some cases 
they have only the twenty cents and in other cases the 
name only without a cent. 

Even in that way, the boasted subscription of ten mDHons 
has dwindled to less than five, and has no more value than 
the two per cent, that they say has been paid for it, and 
which is all devoted to their profuse "preliminary ex- 



penses" — entertainments and employment of orators. She, 
"the centre of the Continent," knows that she can borrow 
the money in New York, the great linancial and commercial 
Metropolis, which has so often proved a staff to her; and 
we will gladly lend it to her, for her credit and enterprise 
are great. Her subscription books are closed to the public. 
The list has never been published in her newspapers as 
ours are daily. The controversies among her real estate 
speculators over a site have been suppressed and will soon 
break out with great violence. 

On the contrary, in New York the whole estimated 
increase of business for the year of the Exposition does 
not exceed an average of two weeks of our ordinary busi- 
ness. New York is not at all captivated with the expecta- 
tion of pecuniary profit. There is no such class here as the 
leading and wealthy men of Chicago. Our wealthy citizens 
are most of them retired from active business and are as 
mnch interested in the prosperity of Chicago and the other 
States and cities of the country as of New York itself. 

We look upon the Fair as an International one embrac- 
ing the whole world. It will either be a credit to the whole 
Country, or, if it fails, a disgrace, not only to the Country, 
but especially to the city where it is undertaken. In this 
respect the whole Country is far ahead of the narrow 
Chicago idea of an overgrown agricultural fair. St. Louis, 
which for this purpose is much better situated than Chi- 
cago, sees this point clearly. 

Very many members of Congress from all parts of the 
country have written to us, recognizing the pre-eminent 
merits of the New York idea, but we ask no pledges. 
They have written also that Chicago has represented that 
New York did not want the Fair, and have solicited 
pledges on that misstatement. They add that pledges so 
obtained are not binding. It is not an affair gotten up to 
help any city or any section ; nor to promote any sectional 



8 



rivalry or money-making scheme. It is for tlie glory of 
the whole Country and to exalt it among the nations of the 
earth. When this location is settled, the question will be, 
What is best for the whole Country ? and we go before 
Congress without one member pledged or even asked for 
his vote or his favor. They will Judge what is for the 
honor of the Country, without regard to New York or Chi- 
cago, and on this point New York has no controversy with 
Chicago. We will present our case fairly and abide by the 
decision. 

The influence of political deals, pledges, entertainments, 
free bar-rooms and brass bands we leave to Chicago exclu- 
sively. 

This is the dignified, manly course, as we conceive it, 
and if we are beaten we will content ourselves with the 
release from a duty which patriotism and love for the whole 
Country alone have induced us to undertake. 

Chicago will then have to master the problem how to 
make her show an International one in an inland City, 
which has not even to-day accommodations suflicient to 
house decently her present travelling public, and to make 
an International affair of an occurrence which, at the best, 
by the Capitals and great cities of the world will be looked 
at as a gathering in an agricultural town in the midst of 
the prairies. 

The celebration of the 400th anniversary of the discovery 
of America was first publicly proposed in New York on the 
31st of May, 1883. It originated in a letter written from 
Madrid, Spain, on 3d of May, 1883, after a consultation 
with King Alphonso XII. and Don Juan F. Riano, Director- 
General of Public Instruction and the Arts, the Duke of 
Yeragua and Seiior Don Emilio Castelar. It was their 
desire to make a celebration of their own, probably at 
their Seaport Palos, at Madrid, Granada, Barcelona and 
other places in Europe. Considering the pre-eminent part 
that Spain took in the discovery of America the King 



9 



claimed that Spain should have the celebration within its 
own borders. Italy was his birthplace. Spain furnished 
the means to carry his ideas into practical effect and was 
entitled to the credit of the discovery. He favored one 
grand anniversary in Spain, and a great fete of all foreign 
vessels at Palos, whence they should proceed, following the 
route of Columbus, to San Salvador and to New York as a 
grand rendezvous, since this was a maritime discovery. 

This would give the character of Internationality to the 
celebration and could not reach Chicago. The Duke of 
Veragua is a descendant of Columbus and bears a striking 
resemblance to his portraits. Sefior Castelar is the most 
renowned orator and statesman of Spain, and recently, in 
an address at Paris, dwelt upon the greatness of sublime 
faith in an ideal. "Columbus," he said, "discovered 
"America through faith. If America had not existed, 
"God would have made it rise from the waters to recom- 
"pense such faith." 

The accounts from Paris at the close of their Exposition 
shows that there were five million visitors from the French 
provinces, and that their aggregate expenditure in Paris 
was five hundred million francs ($100,000,000), and at 
least one and a half million visitors from foreign coun- 
tries, who spent seven hundred and fifty million francs 
($150,000,000), making in all two hundred and fifty million 
dollars ($250,000,000) expended in Paris by visitors during 
the season of the Fair. 

Of these one million and a half of foreign visitors 380,000 
were from England, 226,000 from Belgium, 160,000 from 
Germany, 120,000 from America and 614,000 from other 
countries. 

The attendance at the Paris Exposition reached on some 
days 400,000. 

New York will go before Congress with an actual 
guarantee subscription of not less than five million dollars, 
with the name of every subscriber. This will be a cash sub- 



10 



scription, not promises to pay, nor certificates, and options, 
on which two per cent, only is claimed to have been paid. 
This five millions will not any of it be used for preliminary 
expenses, for that has been expressly provided for by a pre- 
liminary subscription of $200,000. 

These are voluntary offerings of our citizens, which they 
send in without personal solicitation, and are not like those 
of Chicago, which are levied on them by a committee, by 
personal appeals, by threats of ostracism, dynamite and a 
club. 

New York offers a matchless site ; Chicago offers none. 
New York has an adequate and liberal subscription ; Chi- 
cago offers what is left of her two per cent. New York 
can give Internationalitj^ to the Exposition in its broadest 
meaning for the whole world ; Chicago, 1,000 miles inland, 
rejects this idea. 

As Mr. Depew said recently : ' ' There is no unfriendly 
' feeling between New York and Chicago. It is the very 
' reverse, the feeling is most cordial. The trouble is that 
' New York does not think of Chicago, nor notice what 
' occurs there. Once on landing at Liverpool I found a 
' grand agricultural fair going on there with the greatest 
' enthusiasm, but on reaching London in four hours I found 
' that they knew nothing about it. Their five millions of 
' busy people were not aware of what was going on at 
' Liverpool. 

" So, here in New York — a world of itself — with our 
' three and a half millions, we would not know any more 
' of what was engrossing Chicago's whole attention than 
' the occasional remarks of her regular tide of people, 
' coming here for the enjoyments of a great metropolis, in 
' hourly contact with the whole country and the whole 
' world." 

W. E. D. Stokes, 

Secretary. 



11 



The Committee foe the Inteenational Exposition 
OF 1892 OF THE City of New Yoek. 



COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION. 

Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, Hon. "Wm. C. Whitney, 

Chairman. Vice- Chairman. 

William E. D. Stokes, Secretary. 



New Yoek, 9th November, 1889. 

To the CJiamher of Commerce and Industry of Louisiana: 

GrENTLEMEisr : His Honor, Mayor Grrant, of this city, has 
referred to the Committee on Legislation the letter from 
Hon. A. W. Crandell of your body, dated 31st October, 
1889, requesting information from us as to 'the claims of 
this city, in contrast with those of Chicago, for the loca- 
tion of the Exposition, to which, under the direction of 
Hon. Chauncey M. Depew, Chairman of this Committee, I 
have the honor to respond. 

Since the discussion about the location of the Exposition 
of 1892 was opened at Providence, in October, and since the 
defeat of Chicago in the first pitched battle of her own plan- 
ning, her claims have been put forth by her citizens more 
vigorously than ever. Her faith in the old motto, '"''Beaten 
in the battle hut not in the war^'''' is distinctively American; 
but she has offset that defeat by proclaiming a victory in 
her bulletins. 

These claims are on three principal grounds : 

1st. That it is her turn for a great gathering of the people 
of the world. Philadelphia, New York and New Orleans 
have held great Centennial Celebrations, while the North- 
west, of which Chicago is the chief city, has had none. 



12 

2d. That it is a great, growing, healthful, beautiful city, 
with ample accommodations, and is itself an expression of 
the wonderful genius of the nation. 

3d. That it is a great railroad centre, and more readily 
accessible from all parts of the country than any other city 
within it. 

We are as proud to admit these claims as Chicago is to 
assert them ; yet they do not rise to a challenge of the 
superiority of New York, in all these respects. 

The World's Fair at Philadelphia, in 1876, is the only 
one to be compared with the proposed Exposition ; yet it 
commemorated a local event, the Declaration of Independ- 
ence. The New York celebration in May, 1889, lasted for 
three days only in honor of the inauguration of the first 
President — a local event. The fair at New Orleans was 
for the cotton interest. Neither of these were Interna- 
tional, nor were foreign powers invited. 

Time is long enough and the world is large enough for 
Chicago to have her little turn, even if she is not favored 
now. Let her contemplate the beauty and glory she will 
attain, in another century or less, and discover some other 
event more worthy of her honor than the sailor Columbus, 
who was not an inland explorer like the Jesuit fathers, or 
Marquette and La Salle, to whom she should pay homage. 
Like Cinderella she will be a princess, and when she has 
reached the maturity of her beauty the whole world will 
turn out to throng her court. We are not considering 
turns now, but the fit location for the first International 
Exposition this country will ever really hold. 

The people of New York have no local jealousy. They 
concede in the fullest measure the winsome beauty and the 
advantages of Chicago, although she is not over her youth- 
ful ways. The pre-eminence of New York is so marked, 
it is due so much to the concentration of natural forces and 
it is so consolidated and certain, that these questions of 



13 



comparison do not interest ns. We are self-depreciating 
rather tlian boastful. That stage of our youth has passed. 
We admit some narrow and poorly paved streets, some past 
defects in municipal government. We do not palliate, but 
with a strong hand we remedy them. Our pride is in the 
growth and prosperity of the whole country, and we strive 
to promote it in every city and town. If they had left any- 
thing unsaid, we would take up her praises and exalt 
Chicago. We maintain a metropolitan and cosmopolitan 
spirit, and shelter all, rich or poor, who seek our altars. 
The future of New York rests upon its unsurpassed harbor, 
and its broad rivers which open its waterways to the East, 
and westward through the Lakes reach the fertile prairies 
in the heart of the Continent. The magnificence of this 
river scenery is the admiration of the world, for no other 
great city has such scenery within sight. One phase of 
natural beauty is conceded to Chicago, " her broad expanse 
of prairie, and not yet salted sea," although they are " salt- 
ing "~it rapidly. She is waiting for the ship canals to St. 
Louis, or to the St. Lawrence. A dead level does not 
inspire the poetry of Nature, yet she possesses all the 
natural beauty that anything so flat can have. Men cannot 
live and die in Chicago. They cry out, as did Klopstock, 
" Oh ! for the ocean, the ocean !" and they repeat it every 
summer. 

As the centre of the Northwestern system, with its two 
score of railroads radiating over the prairies, filling them 
with towns and cities, and farms the richest in the world, 
Chicago illustrates the great interest New York has taken 
in her advancement. We have given the strongest proofs 
of our faith by the investment of money there. She speaks 
of the population she can collect within a radius of 500 
miles, but it is not greater than we can collect within a 
radius of 260 miles, and excluding the ocean over an area 
only one-sixth as large. 

Every railroad system comes to New York. We have 
driven our railroads westward over mountain passes and 



14 



deep valleys, have pierced the Alleghanies, and on 
their western slopes have built up many railroad centres 
that carry on our main lines to the northwest, the south- 
west and westward to the Pacific. The movement of travel 
from all sections to this City is universal and incomparable, 
for Chicago ranks as one of our tributaries. In addition, 
we have the gi^eat bulk of foreign commerce which touches 
only the sea and gulf coast, for Chicago has not yet made 
herself a seaport. 

It is no wonder that Chicago is proud of her matchless 
growth, and that it gives her undaunted courage, even in 
a contest beyond her strength. Like the Scotch Douglas, 
the forefather of her own statesman, her leaders raise the 
cry, as they rush on to defeat, " Forth ! Heart of Bruce, as 
" thou were wont, and Douglas will follow thee or die." 

There are two questions at the root of this matter. 
1st. Is this Exposition to be a National or International 
one 1 • 

2d. What is its real end and purpose ? 

On these points the idea of Chicago is radically distinct 
from ours, and as distinctly narrow. She contemplates an 
Exposition that ' ' shall be distinctly and grandly Amer- 
ican,''^ and promises an Agricultural Exhibit of lumber, 
grain, farm, dairy and hen products, farm machinery, 
cattle and minerals. This is not an International Exposi- 
tion. Her great orators, taking an illustration from their 
life on grip-cars, tell us that " Chicago has never grappled 
with any great enterprise in vain," and to prove it, 
announces that the decision against them at Providence, 
the first time they provoked an issue, was "most satis- 
factory to Chicago." Are they really bent on following 
the leading of Providence, and coming out for New 
York? 

They have sent out their circulars and appeals to every one 
within their business connections, with special points to each 



15 

profession and trade. They have organized debates and 
discussions. Their citizens have been divided into Com- 
mittees, according to the county of their origin in other 
States, and send urgent calls to their home districts. They 
have sought pledges from every member of Congress, and 
reckoning polite phrases as promises, will have a good lot 
of "chickens counted before they are hatched" to exhibit 
among their farm products. They do it on business prin- 
ciples, send out drummers and solicit votes in Congress as 
they do customers. In all these documents they hold but 
one idea. It is repeated over and again in the same language. 
It is the common idea of the fairs held, every year in every 
county and every State, where bigness is the mark of excel- 
lence — tall cornstalks, heavy cattle, overgrown calves, big 
pumpkins, fat hogs and fast horses. To enlarge one of 
these fairs fco an inconvenient size will not make it grand 
or International. There is not variety enough. Too many 
cattle, too many pumpkins, too much pork and beans 
become monotonous. These things belong to an early stage 
of civilization — such a fair as might have been held in the 
plains of Andalusia four centuries ago. They are very 
common. Except in the great West, people do not travel 
far from home to see them. They would rather come to 
New York for relief from that monotony, for the attractions 
that are peculiar to and always in New York, and every 
year, all who can do so, are sure to come. 

It is true that they specially invite engineers, and as 
there is little engineering in a flat country with shallow 
streams, they offer them the inducement of "an excursion 
"from and to the Atlantic and Pacific seaboards," so that 
they may see the Brooklyn bridge, and the bridges and the 
tunnels across the Hudson and the Harlem. 

Beyond this they go on and depreciate any other kind of 
exhibit. They say plainly that " the attractions of no city 
" in America will induce people of other nations to attend 
" our exposition," because they have larger and finer cities 
of their own. They ridicule " any benighted tourist who 



16 

' • would cross the ocean to inspect our feeble imitations of 
" foreign galleries." They even belittle the number who 
will cross the ocean to attend. The capacity of the ocean 
steamers " would not admit of a hundred thousand foreign- 
" ers visiting our World's fair " ; "their whole number not 
" equaling one average day's attendance"; forgetting that, 
if it were true, this small number would be the elite in 
rank, official distinction, wealth, enterprise and skill. 
Such pains do they take to repel the idea of an Inter- 
national fair, and to limit it to " the natural products of the 
' ' country, to the fertile fields, and to Chicago as the great 
" agricultural centre." Thus do they restrict the world they 
invite to the leanness of their own larder. As the Chicago 
hotel keeper said, laying his pistol and the hash plate on 
the breakfast table, " Gentlemen, I hear you all want hash 
" for breakfast, and you sliall have hash !" 

Then, with an iteration that to a Chicago ear is grateful, 
we hear descriptions of a ' 'Windy City ' ' on the west shore of 
a lake which all know to be flat and low, with an atmosphere 
filled with smoke and soot, and an open slimy sewer run- 
ning through it, into a " lake which is at once her reservoir 
" and refrigerator." Yet this they describe in terms to 
persuade us that it is Jerusalem the Grolden, a city set 
upon a hill, and not one of the cities of the plain, rained on, 
blown on, and desolate, without even salt enough to save it. 

One would suppose that no other city was free from sun- 
strokes, and that they had a monopoly of fresh air and 
pure water, though these may be a marvel in that low 
country. New York, with its breezes alternating from the 
Atlantic to the Alleghanies, and its water from mountain 
springs led thirty-three miles to the city by an aqueduct 
twenty feet in diameter, through the solid rock 300 feet 
below the surface, holds in slight esteem a water supply 
drawn from a lake into which is poured the sewage of a 
whole city and its countless factories. Four miles of 



17 



distance, in an off-shore current, is no better barrier against 
impurity than they have found two miles to be. Their 
irrepressible enthusiasm is commendable, though it makes 
them credulous. They should remember that these tales 
are not impressive away from home. We shall not try to 
rival them in appeals to all parts of the country, nor in 
getting up a trust in wind. We cannot rival them in 
dynamJters and bomb throwers. What attracts these 
Nihilists as soon as they land at once to Chicago will 
deter the most distinguished foreign visitors from ap- 
proaching her. In this respect the atmosphere of Chicago 
is very different from New York. Why do they not make 
their Fair the celebration of the 210th anniversary of the 
landing of La Salle, in January, 1682, in the swamps 
at the mouth of their river. He found it the best portage 
to the Illinois and the Mississippi. He was their first dis- 
coverer and visitor, and described its stormy waters and 
wintry gales, but did not remain there longer than a day. 

Their writers do not appreciate Columbus beyond the 
fictitious story of the egg, which fastens on their farm yard 
fancies. He was no more than a salt water sailor, and did 
not refer to them with the praise to which they are accus- 
tomed from their barnyard fences every morning. Here 
is the description of Columbus : 

" They then saw a band of Indians, who fled. The Chris- 
" tians to get some information ran after them, but could 
" only overtake a young woman, who was impeded by her 
' ' large feet. She came from the far interior and had a diff er- 
*' ent appearance. She had a plate of gold hanging at her 
" nose. She was carried to the Admiral (Columbus). She 
" cried, ' Shekougou, Shekougou, Shekougou.' He gave 
" her several baubles, as bells, a glass and a piece of Portu- 
" guese pottery. He sent her back, without the least dis- 
" gust offered to her, ordering three Indians and three 
" Christians to take her toiler own Company." 

We must admit that we have not an "Auditorium" ; but 
for years we have had the Cooper Union and the Metropolitan 



18 



Opera House, and will soon have the Madison Square gar- 
den, covering two acres, and reaching towards the sky; 
and Ave have here one of Columbus' fair daughters, as old 
as the City itself, Columbia College. 

New York is accustomed to crowds. As the centre of 
three and a half millions, one seventeenth of the total popu- 
lation, within half an hour of the City Hall, it is itself a 
crowd, with ample room to entertain another million or so, 
growing greatly in size and in facilities for internal travel 
every year. This great concentration of jDopulation is 
essential, for the success of the Fair demands 200,000 visi- 
tors each day. 

Your own fellow member Colonel J. C. Wickliffe put it 
admirably at your meeting on the 30th October, as reported 
in the Picayune. 

"As a proof of the friendly feeling of New York he calls 
' attention to Governor Hill' s speech to the Pan-American 
' delegates putting in a good word for the South and 
' being instrumental in bringing about the supplemental 
' journey here. New York thinks of the South always, 
' and not only when it wants something. 

" If the Paris Exposition had been held at some interior 
' city of France, it would not have been the same success. 
' Paris is the best known city. In the same way New 
' York and New Orleans are the best known cities of 
' America, because of their cosmopolitan character. New 
' York has vast hotels, amusements and other facilities. 
' If New York is filled up, it has Brooklyn, Jersey City 
' and Philadelphia to faU. back upon. If Chicago is filled 
' up, there is no other place to go to, except to lodge the 
' visitors in a dry goods box and to board them at a pea- 
' nut stand. On sentimental grounds he opposed Chicago 
' — as the place Avhere the American flag could be hissed 
' without the hisser being chastised. If it is to be an 
' American Exposition, he wanted it held where the 
" American flag is respected, and in the metropolis of 
" America." 



19 



It will be for Congress to decide which city will have 
this International fair, and the decision will not be con- 
trolled by the amount of money the cities raise. Other 
considerations will prevail — where the foreign exhibits 
can most conveniently be received, where our own manu- 
facturers can most conveniently present their goods, and 
our designers and inventors study new ideas to be put 
to a practical use. 

Chicago is not the only instance of rapid growth in this 
country. There are other examples quite as notable. Bir- 
mingham and Asheville can claim the locatioii on the same 
grounds. Nor is Chicago the only city that has burned 
down in wood and been built up in stone, praiseworthy as 
that is. Atlanta has done it, and so has Boston, though 
Boston excited the jealousy of Chicago because, while 
fewer square miles were devastated, more millions in value 
were destroyed. 

The lavish expenditure to defend her claims shows that 
some great local advantage must be contemplated. That 
will not influence the decisions, when the question is, 
which is the best location ? in favor of the city which wants 
it most and is fitted for it the least. It will not influ- 
ence foreign exhibitors to send their goods there. They 
want the best place. 

The great value to us in the Exposition is what our 
inventors and designers acquire from other nations. 
Columbus had all the scientiflc knowledge of his day. It 
was a scientific induction that the eastern continent must 
be balanced by a western, that convinced him that there 
was something to. discover west of the Atlantic, and this 
same search for knowledge prevails at the present day, and 
is to be encouraged by the fair. 

The points on which Chicago rests her claims remind one 
of Commodore Vanderbilt. After scrutinizing carefully 
a lot of horses from which he was expected to select one, 
he began praising the mane and tail of a young roan mare. 
"Why," asked the jockey, "do you speak of her mane 



20 



and her tail?" "Because," said the Commodore, "it is 
the only thing I see in her to admire." 

We think but little of these arguments, and rely on 
the absolute strength of the feature of Internationality and 
the cool deliberate judgment of Congress, without the aid 
of reception rooms and loaded sideboards to greet the mem- 
bers as they arrive at Washington. 

The plan of Chicago does not rise to the level of the idea 
of New York. New York starts from a higher plane, be- 
neath which Chicago can exert and glorify herself without 
interference. She leaves to us the broader view of an Inter- 
national exposition, which we are ready to carry out. 

In 1492, the Continent of Africa had been circumnavi- 
gated and the northern seas explored. The East Indies 
had also been reached through the Red Sea. Maps and 
globes had been made and sold. They showed a blank, 
west of the Atlantic, toward which the shores of India were 
extended. Reaching India by crossing this vacancy and 
sailing westward had been considered for centuries. The 
sailors were brave, but the small vessels were not fitted to 
contend with the gigantic storm winds of the Equinox, and 
superstition filled the boundless sea with unknown terrors. 
False Science, the overwhelming influence of the Church 
and the folly of Kings forbade all enterprise. Columbus 
urged his claim, for half a life time, before he prevailed, 
and then gained it, not from the courage of a man, but 
from the sympathy of a woman, the woman's heart won, as 
ever, by the dangers he had passed and the greater dangers 
he longed to encounter. 

To the Old World, the discovery opened new fields of 
adventure and wealth. Population overflowed into it, but 
they left behind human tyranny over human thought and 
action. The same people from Western Europe grew up 
on this side in native freedom in hardships and prosperity, 
and on the other side the Atlantic, under their old despot- 



21 



isms. We have justified and demonstrated our freedom, 
have revolted at their domination, and have brought them 
slowly to accept and believe in our principles. This is the 
lesson of this quadri-centennial and this is the cross it will 
hold up for the future to the whole world, with larger 
meaning in the motto, In hoc signo mnces, than it ever 
contained before. This is what Columbus predicted, and 
called on us to celebrate. 

This broader view is natural to New York. It is Inter- 
national and for the world. It is not National, nor for this 
country only. This kind goes not forth by boasting. We 
invite them to see the moral and material results of our 
principles. England, France, Holland, Sweden, and Spain, 
who once owned these Western Continents, see the greater 
successes of their children. If they seek the causes they 
are not concealed. They can find them in a word, Free- 
dom, the uppermost word in all this land. 

Between this continent and the Old World New York is 
the portal, not the toll-gate. It fitly represents the spirit of 
the country ; its liberty, equality and fraternity is extended 
to all nations. The wealth of the world enters here, and 
with it, the men of courage and enterprise who wield it, 
who seek new discoveries and new wealth, as of old, in our 
generous resources. This discovery is going on year by 
year. 

Chicago leaves it also for us to look into the future. The 
young and energetic men of this day have a future to look 
forward to. At the beginning of the 20th Century its 
destiny will be in their hands. 

"No pent-up Utica contracts our powers, 

" For the whole boundless Continent is ours," 

was once a motto of New York, as it has come to-day to be 
of Chicago. The Continent, of which Chicago is the centre 
and the pride, has been compassed. New York has passed 
beyond this sentiment and for its dominance now 

"Leans o'er the wistful limit of the World." 



The close of this Century sees a gi'eat change over the 
face of the earth. Steam and electricity have done it. The 
hand of man grasps the whole vt^orld, and holding it within 
reach, his nerve and will-power, and his knowledge, are 
becoming immediate and instantaneous. There are no 
longer any undiscovered regions, nor unknown dark Con- 
tinents. Africa is parcelled out. The islands of the sea 
are appropriated. The waste breadths of our own country- 
are surveyed and fenced in, and laid out into States. The 
bii'ds of the air, the beasts of the field, and Leviathan and 
the fishes in the sea are no longer under man' s dominion 
to destroy, but to protect and to count as the stock on his 
farm. The fair face of nature must be, as the Yellowstone 
Park, circumscribed from man. This description will not 
be found overstated at the beginning of the next Century. 

From this post, at the great outlet to the four seas, this 
is the dominion toward which New York looks, not for 
itself, but for the country, as the sentinel on the verge of 
the camp, to spread its freedom, its principles, its influence 
and its prosperity over the whole earth, and to gain for it 
the moral and peaceful ascendency which the triumph of 
our principles will ensure. " For all that is not behind us 
"is before us, and it is better to have a future than a 
"past." 

This view is enforced by the growing community of 
interests throughout the world. It is the capital and 
enterprise of the Atlantic slope that has been the basis of 
Chicago's wealth, as it is the wealth of the Old World that 
has been for four centuries developing the resources. of-the 
New and laying the foundations of its greatness. This is a 
homage to its freedom, and an invitation to its supremacy. 
The improvements in the art of war are making National 
quarrels impossible, for war itself shall be destroyed. To 
this New York has long given a pledge in its undefended 
harbor, lying open to the sea. 

Count Shouvaloff happily said of this country in his 



I 



23 



speech at the recent banquet given in honor of Minister 
William Walter Phelps, at Berlin, that we "stand 
"alone among the great powers as wanting nothing and 
" fearing nothing." 

New York goes beyond the exposition of our own pro- 
ducts and growth, to think most of the invitation to other 
Nations to exhibit here their triumphs to us ; and they will 
respond because they wish to see the causes of our marvel- 
ous growth, and to discuss the secret of our prosperity. 

In a broad and far-reaching view, the design and the end 
of the Exposition is to advance civilization and the domina- 
tion of science over nature, to increase the rewards of 
labor and the comforts and economies of life, and to pro- 
mote freedom and morality. This is the highest idea of 
human welfare, to free man from the curse of labor that 
fell upon him in the Garden of Eden. 

Human happiness depends upon labor, so we do not seek 
to be freed from it, but we do seek to make a day' s labor 
bring larger results, to elevate a larger number of people 
above the starvation point, where the whole day's labor 
feeds them and no more, to begin accumulations and create 
capital for every man. Steam, electricity, new inventions, 
new railroads, new channels of trade, new countries, make 
labor more productive. The value of the wages of labor 
has increased during the four centuries past fifty-fold. 
The saving of time, the simultaneousness of knowledge, 
the rapidity of decisions increases wealth and promotes 
justice. Peace follows, for war is one injustice avenging 
another. 

This is the foundation of International friendship and 
prosperity, through all the peoples of the earth, as National 
union exists through the States of this country ; to partici- 
pate in their successes and to admit them to ours, to make 
the field of prosperity as broad as the world. 

In stock and agriculture Europe has but little to show us. 



24 



We have taken the finest of her best breeds of cattle, her best 
vines and fruits, her best seeds and plants, and improved 
them all. In these respects an exhibit of the West at 
Chicago would be unapproachable. But Europe can show us 
articles we do not possess, and achievements we have not 
attempted. These will challenge our skill and ingenuity to 
surpass them, as we are wont. This will be a greater gain 
than any feeling of self-satisfaction over our own products. 
As Chicago asserts, our whole country will be our exhibit, 
and no one can doubt the strength of the impression it will 
make. 

They have works of fine art greatly surpassing ours in 
their variety, and still more in the power of imagination. 
They are the result of the highest human attainment, and 
the spring of the purest human happiness. They have 
these arts applied to buildings, interiors, decoration and 
furniture which we are fast learning. They can show sur- 
passing excellence in the most ponderous machinery and in 
the most delicate; in metal work of every kind, perfect in 
streng-th and in exquisite design; in the adaptations of 
electrical contrivances; in all the fabrics of the loom down 
to the invisible lace; in gems and precious stones; in books, 
music, photography; in wines and perfumery; and in 
almost every industrial art. These must be brought under 
the eye of our own skilled mechanics and inventors. For 
them the Patent Office Museum and the fairs of the 
American Institutes are far from being enough. 

]S"ew York is thoroughly prepared for the Exposition. 
The dissensions in Chicago, when they begin to select a site, 
are yet to come, but they have not yet been enough in earnest 
for that. Here we quelled the rivalry of all the property 
owners by disregard of their claims and selecting the very 
best. On Bloomingdale Heights with Riverside and Morn- 
ingside Parks there is abundance of room. It rises high 
above the waters of the Hudson River, with steep declivities 
on three sides, and has an area of 184 acres available for 



25 



buildings. Much additional space can be had along River- 
side Park. This'sifce is now beyond further question. 

The Central Park affords two sites, long ago set apart for 
Museum buildings, in each of which sections of the 
museums have been erected. That of the Museum of 
Natural History has 20 acres and of Art 18 acres. These 
buildings the City propose to expedite and complete. 
Together they will supply, for the priceless exhibits, 50 
acres of flooring in fire proof buildings, and cover one-half 
of the ground required for buildings by the estimate of the 
Committee, with the open park around them. The other 
half, or three times as much, can find ample space on 
Bloomingdale Heights. There is another site in Central 
Park of 20 acres, set apart and partly occupied as a Horti- 
cultural Hall and Garden, which can be completed. 

For broader areas, for temporary structures, 60 acres 
next north of Central Park and adjoining Bloomingdale 
Heights on the east can be had. If we wish to attract from 
Chicago the cattle yards and " punkin shows," we have 
along the Harlem River, within three miles, a thousand 
acres accessible and available. 

Central Park is in the City, and more than half sur- 
rounded by houses. Bloomingdale Heights is at its north- 
west corner between Riverside and Morningside Parks, and 
accessible by half a dozen lines of surface cars, as well as 
the Elevated and Hudson River railroads and the Hudson 
River steamboats. 

The financial plan of the City is adequate. The City 
authorities are ready to expend fifteen millions in land and 
buildings. This will complete the two Museums and the 
Horticultural building in Central Park, will purchase for a 
park the land on Bloomingdale Heights and erect the 
buildings there, and will provide all the land needed for 
temporary buildings. The guarantee subscription of Five 
millions for working capital will, with such aid as may be 
had from the State or Congress, suffice for the rest. The 
cautious movements of New York are an assurance of final 



26 



success. Our subscriptions represent all cash and not 
paper, worth " two per cent." or less. 

Foreign visitors will land at this City. There is no better 
place for the exhibition of their art works and manufac- 
tures. They can be landed on the fair grounds. There is 
no more central place in the country to collect our own. 
For all purposes, except agricultural products, it suflBces. 
The fleets of all nations and their yachts will be here. 
They cannot reach the " unsalted sea." There will, in any 
event, be a great gathering in this City, and for all the ends 
of an International Fair, this will be the site. To ask them 
to go to Chicago, would be the same as if Chicago located 
her national fair at Waukesha, because of the subordinate 
advantage that there was the spring from which she brought 
her bottled drinking water. 

In every stranger here there will be the desire to see the 
country, its vast distances, its newly grown cities of a million, 
not yet so "old as a man's life." Chicago wiR be their 
Mecca. But still these visitors will prefer to live in New 
York, and to be fed at the greatest place in the world for 
the excellence and variety of its market. There is to be 
but one fair, and New York is the place. 

Notwithstanding your close business and social alliances 
with Chicago and your community of feeling, we can appeal 
confidently to your impartial and deliberate judgment. 

To the impartiality of the citizens of Louisiana we can 
trust this question with confidence in a just decision. At 
the seat of an empire which commands the whole Missis- 
sippi Valley, from the Alleghany to the Rocky Mountains, 
including Chicago, and at the point on your grand river 
reached by the early Spanish explorers who followed Colum- 
bus, a commercial rival of New York — each New in name 
but old in history and cosmopolitan in spirit — independent 
land chivalric — you are the just umpire in a contest which 
is arousing the whole country. If j^ou fail us, our only 
appeal will be to the beautiful women of New Orleans. 

Yours respectfully, 

W. E. D. Stokes. 



r 



27 



By permission from the Cosmopolitan Magazine, December, 1889. 

NEW YORK'S CANDIDACY FOR THE WORLD'S 
FAIR OF 1892. 



A Reply to Senator Farwell, op Illinois. 

In the same Magazine of November, 1889. 
By William Waldorf Astor. 

I am invited by the management of the Cosmopolitan to 
reply to an article recently published in that Journal by the 
Honorable Charles B. Farwell, United States Senator from 
Illinois, advocating the claims of Chicago to the proposed 
Columbus Exhibition. In presenting a Iqw points in favor 
of Nev^' York, 1 wish to begin by declaring myself cordi- 
ally of the honorable Senator's opinion that the emulation 
between the two cities should be conducted without bitter- 
ness or partisanship, and only in a spirit of broad and 
liberal rivalry. 

The nine pages occupied by the Senator are more than 
half taken up with illustrations of streets and parks and 
monuments, and, of the text, the greater portion is culled 
from the note-books of travelers and writers, for which, 
since he adopts them, he is responsible equally with any 
part of his argument. Less than one-quarter of the nine 
pages is covered by his own words — as though he had found 
difficulty in employing his pen to divert a momentous and 
historic celebration from the metropolis of America to a 
provincial city. Those of his sentences which are not bor- 
rowed embody three propositions in su^oport of the claims 
of Chicago : 

First, That it is easy of access to farmers. 

Second, That it is the choice of lumber men, iron men 
and machinists. 

Third, That several previous exhibitions having been 
held in the East and South, it is now the turn of the West. 



28 



The Senator dismisses very lightly the advantages to be 
derived from the maritime position of JSTew York, and his 
argument is interesting, in that it reveals the scope of the 
celebration he has in view, and makes it as a National, and 
not an International, Exhibition. He thinks the first and 
last consideration should be the convenience of our western 
population. The ratio of foreign visitors and exhibits 
would, in his opinion, be small, and doubtless this antici- 
pation will be sustained if Congress decides upon an inland 
location. The Senator proceeds to fasten upon his concep- 
tion of the Columbus Fair a distinctively agricultural char- 
acter. It is the interest of the stockbreeders that chiefly 
appeals to him, and he designates the products of the farm 
as first entitled to the best opportunity for display. One 
readily hears in his utterance the voice of Illinois, when he 
claims the Exhibition because the Secretary of Agriculture 
pronounces Chicago ' ' the centre of the greatest agricul- 
tural and stock-raising region on earth "' ; and the solemnity 
of the Senator's discourse is relieved by the incidental 
facetiousness of the declaration that an eastern man should 
visit Chicago annually, to be " inoculated with unrepressed 
enthusiasm." 

New York will with difficulty concede these things he 
so easily takes for granted. Our geographical situation is 
not to be disposed of in the careless sentence of a magazine 
article. If the Senator will turn from the map of Illinois 
to the map of the United States, he will observe that New 
York is the point from which all lines radiate. We com- 
municate eastward with Boston and New England, and 
northward with Montreal and Canada. Westward stretch 
the great Pacific roads to California. Through New Jersey 
run railways that spread over the Grulf States from Florida 
to Texas. And seaward come to us the ships of all coun- 
tries — from Europe, and from the Orient, and from the 
South Sea. New York is the point of contact between 
America and the nations of the earth. It stands in the 
gateway between the New World and the Old. It is the 



29 



place to which three-fourths of our commerce is drawn, to 
which the traveler visiting this hemisphere directs his 
course, and which, in the thoughts and writings of foreign 
communities, be they of high or low degree, stands as the 
type and centre and head of everything pre-eminently 
American. 

The Senator from Illinois differs, however, with the 
majority, and quotes a statement that "Chicago is the one 
purely and distinctively American city on this continent." 
In what, then, does it differ from the others ? Is Lanca- 
shire more English than York, or Calais more French than 
Lyons ? Or how is Chicago more distinctively American 
than St. Louis ? Seventy-live years ago the site of Chicago 
was a wilderness as silent as Manhattan Island when Hud- 
son first beheld it. Like San Francisco, its wealth came 
in a few years of sudden prosperity. Like Boston, it rose 
superbly from its ashes. Like all the rest of us, its splen- 
dor is of recent growth — more recent, indeed, than that of 
any other. 

The Senator further advances the architectural magnifi- 
cence of Chicago's private residences as a logical reason for 
placing the great Exhibition within their aureole. Chicago 
is the " London of America," possessing "metropolitan 
imperialism," and worthy of the designation of "the young 
giant of the prairies." Its houses, he declares, are 
"palaces." We know them well, those palaces, all of 
which were built with borrowed money, and most of which 
to-day are mortgaged from cornerstone to skylight. We 
know them well, those palaces, where every sign of wealth 
abounds, and where the front door is opened by a house- 
maid. We know them well, those palaces, whose occu- 
pants are "all out on their doorsteps," as they used to sit 
in New York seventy years ago, when our "palaces" were 
built on twenty-tive-foot front lots, and when social life 
was primitive in the extreme. 

We, in New York, conceive the significance of this Ex- 
hibition to be something higher than lumber, iron and live 



30 



stock. We have not in mind the agricultural show the 
Senator meditates. We aim to make it an historic exem 
plar of the last four centuries — to illustrate what has been 
achieved in civilization since the discovery of America. 
And as that discovery led on to still vaster explorations, to 
the Horn and the Cape route, and through all Chinese 
Walls of Asiatic intolerance, and northward toward the 
frozen Pole, and southward across the forests of Africa, so 
would we bring to this Exhibition, by all routes, and from 
the remotest barbarism as from the most accomplished 
civilization, the distinctive and characteristic feature of 
each. 

When Columbus steered from Palos, he launched, half 
consciously, the entire human race upon an intellectual sea 
whose ultimate shores have not yet been explored. Behind 
the star-guided track of his vessels lay the ignorance, the 
feudalism, the bigotry of the Middle Ages ; before him, 
unseen by the material eye, but divined, we may believe, 
by his spiritual vision, stretched realms of advancement 
and discovery in strange and marvelous paths of learning. 
His achievement aroused the minds of men from the torpor 
of dark and cruel centuries, and liberated human thought, 
and awoke the genius of invention, and prepared the way 
for religious toleration, and led to emancipation from the 
absolute rule of kings. Those are the greatest benefits that 
have ever blessed the race, and these thoughts underlie the 
material progress which is their natural exponent. From 
them sprang literature and exquisite refinement in every 
art, and the triumphs of science, that fill this age with 
marvels as wondrous as the visions and dreams of the 
alchemists of old. 

If the Columbus Exhibition be merely an ordinary dis- 
play of products and manufactures, it will fail of that sug- 
gestive meaning from which it should derive its prof oundest 
import. Its grandest purpose, and one far beyond mere 
material prosperity, should be to mark the progress made 
in the civilization of all mankind since the discovery of this 



31 



continent to the present day. In that year, 1892, we should 
gauge the human intellect by its achievements of the last 
four hundred years. This Exhibition should display the 
advance made by every country in the chief spheres of 
thought and labor that have liberated and instructed and 
ennobled tHe human race. It should compare the fifteenth 
with the nineteenth century. It should contrast the im- 
potent mechanisms of the past with the marvels of beauty 
and power and delicacy of the present. It should station, 
in view of the mighty steamships that cross and recross 
the ocean, the caravel of mediaeval Italy, the galleon of 
ancient Spain, the pinnace of Raleigh, the Half Moon 
yacht of Hendrick Hudson. It should place beside the 
pictured missals of monkish cloisters the printing-press 
that distributes each day's news from every part of the 
world. Besides the post-chaise of Franklin's day, which 
carried the mails in six weeks from Boston to Phila- 
delphia, should stand one of the locomotives that flies 
a train in six days from ocean to ocean. It should lay 
the wooden letter-type, which was the mechanical marvel 
of the time of Columbus, with the electrical appli- 
ances which are the wonder of our own. Within it should 
be gathered types of life and industry from every section 
of the Union. Within it should be seen the homes famil- 
iar to every part of this continent, and recalling every age 
— the Southern plantation, the backwoodsman cabin, the 
puritan's house of the seven gables, the gold miner's camp, 
the Canadian trapper' s lodge, the Dutch cottage of Died- 
rich Knickerbocker, the wigwam of the Iroquois, the Cali- 
fornian adobe, the ice hut of the Esquimaux, and back 
even to the semblance of the mound-builder's inclosure. 
To such an Exhibition should be brought representatives 
from every tribe and nation of the inhabited globe. And 
from such gathering as this men might study the possi- 
bilities of the future by the teaching of the past. In look- 
ing back across the strifes and follies and crimes of olden 
times, they could meditate the great lesson of the comity 



32 



and forbearance of one nation toward another, and seek 
ways of more perfect Justice, and study tlie paths of wis- 
dom and moderation. 

For over a century New York has held not merely a 
material, but an historic, supremacy. The history of New 
York, more than that of any other city, is the history of 
the progress and development of the whole country. In it 
George Washington was inaugurated. At the close of the 
Revolutionary War it was chosen to be the first capital of 
the infant nation. In population, in wealth, in manufac- 
tures, in public works, in commercial relations, it is the 
capital of the Union to-day. Chicago is an inland city, far 
from the touch of foreign countries, surrounded by its 
lumber, iron and live stock, and unknown to Europeans, 
except for a quizzical curiosity which its extraordinary 
growth inspires ; and from the circumstance that they read 
of it as a refuge for their own political outcasts, who go 
thither, not as inhabitants, but as incendiaries, to establish 
in it their socalistic fraternities, to manufacture anarchist 
bombs, and to hiss the American flag in public. 

To render the Columbus Exhibition successful, it is indis- 
pensable that the interest of foreign lands be enlisted. 
Does the Senator think it nothing to ask French and 
English manufacturers to send rare and costly and perish- 
able wares across the Atlantic ? Does he think such ex- 
hibits will be augmented in number and value by adding 
to the sea voyage the risk and delay and expense of land 
transportation ? Bearing in mind the relatively small ex- 
hibits sent by England and France to Vienna, by reason of 
the inconveniences of transportation, will they be more 
likely to send to Chicago ? Is it not evident that the bulk 
of exhibits sent to the shore of Lake Michigan would be 
infinitely less than that sent thii'teen years ago to Phila- 
delphia, beside the ocean ? With what are manufacturers 
abroad to be tempted ? Certainly not with the prospect of 
advertising their merchandise, for already Americans 
throng among them and are the most extravagant buyers 



33 

in every European market. Nor will prizes and awards 
allure men who have already reaped a harvest of medals 
and honorable mentions. No, the sole incentive that will 
bring foreign exhibitors is the keen rivalry of their own 
immediate competitors; and as, even then, the motive must 
be very urgent, and the risk and cost and difficulty very 
slight, it may be confidently asserted that the necessity of 
breaking bulk between the place of shipment and the exhi- 
bition site, would be to them a fatal objection. 

The Senator's argument in favor of Chicago rests upon 
the mistaken premise that an inland and prosaic city can 
be made to appear accessible to distant countries, and at- 
tractive, and of central importance. In the characteristics 
he ascribes to the projected Exhibition, he pictures a 
county fair on a vast scale, and doubtless in accord with 
the ideal and interest of the State of Illinois. But that is 
all — and that is not enough. For this anthem the note of 
a single instrument, however shrill its piping, will not suf- 
fice. Only the full concert of all nations, and the strength 
and sweetness and inspiration that all humanity may 
bring, can commemorate the debt that all humanity owes 
to Christopher Columbus. 



34 



The Committee for the Inteenational Exposition of 
1892, OF THE City of New Yoek, 



COMMITTEE ON LEGISLATION. 

Hon. Chauncet M. Depew, Chairman. Hon. William C. Whitney, Vice-Chairman. 
William E. D. Stokes, Secretary. 



At the Board of Trade of Providence, Rhode Island, there 
was held on the ^8th October, 1889, a meeting of the mer- 
cantile and manufacturing interests of the State, to ascer 
tain the feelings of the State in regard to the location of 
the International Exposition of 1892. His Excellency 
Governor Herbert W. Ladd, who presided, had invited the 
Mayors of New York and of Chicago to present the claims 
of their cities. 

In response to this, the Mayor of New York referred the 
invitation to the Committee on Legislation. Mr. Depew, the 
Chairman, sent the telegram, and Mr. Stokes, the Secre- 
tary, sent the letter which follows : 



New Yoek City, Oct. 8th, 1889. 

To His Excellency Goveenoe Ladd, 

Providence, Rhode Island : 

The Mayor has referred your telegram to the Committee 
on Legislation, and I am Just in receipt of it. We lind it 
impossible for a representative to be at your meeting to-day. 
New York is deeply in earnest and will use every effort to 
secure the Fair and to make it a success. Our Secretary, 
Mr. Stokes, has sent you a communication. We confi- 
dently rely on the assistance of Rhode Island in making 
the Fair at New York the greatest exhibition ever held. 



Chauncey M. Depew. 



35 

New Yokk, 146 Broadway, ) 
October 7th, 1889. f 

To His Excellency Goveenoe Ladd, 

Providence, E,. I. 
Sir : 

Your telegram to His Honor Hugh J. Grant, Mayor of 
this City, inviting him to present at the meeting to be 
held at noon to-morrow, at Providence, the claims of New 
York, as the location for the Exposition of 1892, was 
received to-day, and was referred by him to me, as he tele- 
graphed to you. 

I regret that I am not able, at such short notice, to 
arrange this evening to attend your meeting in person. I 
will, however, on behalf of the Committee on which I am 
placed by the Mayor, endeavor briefly to state to you the 
reasons why the Exposition of 1892 should be held in the 
City of New York. 

The chief reason is found in the fact that the proposed 
fair is to be an International one. It should, therefore, be 
held at the city most accessible to foreign countries. No 
other place meets this condition. 

New York is the greatest seaport of the continent, most 
frequented by steamers and with the largest number of 
arrivals and departures of trans-Atlantic passengers. It is 
the commercial centre, and in financial and business affairs 
it is the heart of the continent. It is, as well, the greatest 
manufacturing city, and all this can be affirmed without 
disparagement of any other city. 

Of the whole continent, extending 3,000 miles from the 
Atlantic to the Pacific, more than one-third of the popula- 
tion is contained in States within 400 miles of New York. 
Within ten miles of the city there are about three and one- 
half millions of people. It is the most accessible point on 
the seaboard, by railroad and water transit, and is the ter- 
minus of every railroad. 



36 



It has the largest hotel accommodation for travelers. 
These considerations have force because the success of the 
Exposition depends npon the number of visitors who daily 
seek admission. This number depends on local density of 
population and accessibility to those who travel to attend it. 

The experience of European nations in managing and 
locating their great fairs enforces these views. 

They have located them at their great centres of popula- 
tion and travel, at Paris, London and Vienna, and never 
elsewhere. 

New York City is known all over the world better than 
any other city of this country, and as well as London or 
Paris. 

It has come to equal, and in some respects surpass them 
among the great cities of Christendom. The site selected 
for the Fair has more than ample area and is along the bor- 
der of the Hudson River, where vessels can land at the 
Fair gTounds in deep water, and this water communication 
is not broken by a shallow or a bar for ships of a heavy 
draft to all the remote shores of the ocean. This means 
cheap freight and charges for all the exhibits sent to the 
Fair. The site rises from the water border to a round hill 
150 feet in height, with a Hat top, admirably adapted for 
public buildings. There is no such site within the limits 
of any city in this country or in Europe. It commands a 
view of forty mUes in every direction, from the mountains 
to the sea. It is surrounded by beautiful parks. 

For healthfulness and cool summer breezes over the 
broad Hudson River, and from Long Island South, it is 
the pleasantest spot in the whole Atlantic slope. New 
York City itself is the finest exhibit this country has to 
show. Not only does the city meet all the conditions 
required for the location, but these conditions exclude 
every other city. The site has been determined and the 
financial plans will be well matured and acceptable, for the 
Fair is to be International and not a Fair of this country'or 
any section of it. 



37 



We celebrate the discovery by Columbus ; he crossed the 
sea four centuries ago ; he reached the continents of 
North and South America ; he did it for the countries of 
Europe, whose explorations forthwith extended over the 
whole earcli. It is not simply an affair of our country, but 
for the whole world. And for this, not we alone, but all 
nations and peoples unite to do him honor. The Fair must 
of necessity be International and the only location is the 
chief city of the New World which he discovered. 

Yours very respectfully, 

W. E. D. Stokes, 
Secretary. 

The response from Chicago was by Mayor Dewitt C. 

Cregier : 

Chicago, 7th October, 1889. 
GovERNOE Ladd : 

We respectfully submit the following questions and 
suggestions : 

First. — What are the indispensable requirements of an 
eligible location. for the World's Fair % 

Second. — Confining our question to cities of over a 
million inhabitants, has any other than Chicago so cool, 
comfortable and wholesome a Summer climate : Can any 
offer to millions of visitors in the dog days an equal im- 
munity from sun stroke and disease. 

Third. — Has any so limitless a supply of fresh air and 
fresh water as the works now in process of construction 
insure to Chicago from the great lake which is at once her 
refrigerator and her fountain. 

Fourth. — With her eleven hundred and sixty hotels and 
thirty-eight railroads, can any offer equal hotel accommoda- 
tion and railroad facilities, with assurance from hotels of 
no increased charges, and with like assurance that inland 



33 



transportation of foreign exhibits will not exceed the cost 
that Wi]] be incurred in the unavoidable breaking 'bulk 
with extra carting and handling elsewhere. 

Fifth.— As World's Fairs and national celebrations have 
hitherto been held in the extreme East and South, is it not 
the AVest' s turn now, by the rules of rotation and by every 
consideration of comity and fairness. 

Sixth. — Why should not all Americans and attending 
foreigners have an opportunity of judging of the country 
as a whole, not by a mere inspection of its outer edge, but 
by coming into its body and witnessing its phenomenal 
success. 

Sevejstth. — Why should they not all come to its greatest 
inland city; a fair in itself as a marvelous gTowth of a few 
years from a frontier camp to a Metropolis of immeasur- 
able destiny, and see for themselves whether it is true or 
false that she is the focus of the greatest inland commerce 
of the world. That she has in fact the finest group of busi- 
ness sti'uctures, the most extensive park system, the largest 
and most beautiful drives, including that named after and 
Avorthy of Sheridan, to be found on this continent, and in 
the absence of an Eiffel tower, another structure, the Audi- 
torium, of several times the cost and incomparably greater 
utility. 

Eighth. — Why is it not peculiarly appropriate that the 
Columbus Exposition should be distinctively and grandly 
American ? 

NiJfTH. — Why should not the nation bid this great young 
city, covering one hundred and seventy-six square miles, 
a hearty God speed in the great enterprise with which it 
grapples. As the West consumes a great proportion of 
Rhode Island's manufactures why should not Rhode 
Island be conspicuous in presenting her manufactured pro- 
ducts to her western consumers. A small State, yet her 



39 



products being vast, enables her to[^grasp the situation and 
take a truly broad and national view of the question. 

Please defer action for a week and we will send a repre- 
sentative who will present facts of greater importance 
bearing upon this subject. Answer. 

Dewitt C. Ceegiee. 

In accordance with this request the meeting was ad- 
journed to Tuesday, 15th October, 1889. To this meeting 
the Committee on Legislation sent the following letter : 

New Yoek, 14th October, 1889. 

To Ms Excellency, the Hon. Heebeet W. Ladd, 

Governor and Chairman, Providence, R. I. 
Sie: 

We recognize the wisdom of the adjournment of your 
meeting to consider the location of the International Expo- 
sition of 1892, and your courtesy in re-opening the discus- 
sion of the claims of Chicago for the location. 

Besides the considerations we had the honor to present 
to you at your first meeting, we will add a few further 
suggestions. 

No one is prouder of Chicago than the people of this 
city. It was a great citizen of New York, who, years ago, 
said "Young man, go West, and grow up with the 
country." They went ; and so Chicago grew up to be great 
in obedience to New York. The result is a crown of honor 
to her. Many of her foremost citizens went from New 
York. Her men of wealth and intelligence, when they re- 
tire from active business, come, many of them, to this Met- 
ropolitan and Cosmopolitan City to add to its renown. The 
bond between us is growing every day and can never be 
severed. 

The elements of Chicago's greatness, recounted by Mayor 
Cregier, are justly impressive. Every man will uphold 



40 



them as he would the praises of a beautiful sister. Her 
salubrity, her water works, her hotels, her railroads, her 
superb buildings, her parks are marvelous, and she is 
undoubtedly the site for anything that is, as she claims, 
" to be distinctively and grandly American."' But they do 
not reach the jDoint of making her the focus of Intema- 
tionality, nor do they claim it. 

New York has like elements of city growth and proofs 
of prosperity ; but as New York compares itself with Lon- 
don and Paris, cities rich with the expenditure of centuries 
and the embellishments of renowned art, it strives modestly 
after the finest and severest results in building, in the per- 
fection of its adaptations to business and domestic life, 
and in landscape art as shown in its parks, with a subdued 
ambition to become the best modem city, not of this coun- 
try, but of all Christendom. Its commerce is not because 
of its own efforts, but because the world of ships crowd 
into its harbor. Its railroads come here to meet and parti- 
cipate in this commerce, and as the great New Yorker 
whom we have already quoted, Horace Greeley, whom 
Chi<:;ago also venerates, said when he was shown the extent 
of her great railroad systems, ' ' All these roads have one 
terminus in New York." 

These things make New York the international point of 
this continent. There are few grounds on which to dispute 
the claim of Chicago to be " the focus of the greatest 
inland commerce of the world," if that were the question, 
if this were a national fair, if it were an affair of this con- 
tinent, but this is to be an International Exposition and 
it is the feature of inter nationality that gives the preference 
to New York. What the whole country has to do with 
international affairs passes into and is received fi'om New 
York. Its growth is a natural concentration, and when 
foreign visitors with their goods arrive here, they will say, 
" Neplus iilira^''- not even for the attractions of beautiful 
Chicago. 

In the May Centennial of this year people poured into 



41 



this city, over a million and a half of them, and not one 
lacked food or shelter ; nor were the accommodations of 
the hotels exhausted. These are matters of only ordinary 
every day concern. 

Amid a resident population of three and one-half mil- 
lions the advent of a few hundred thousand more does not 
put us or them to the slightest inconvenience. The number 
of passengers carried by our city cars is daily counted by 
millions. 

Onr Summer climate so closely resembles that of Rhode 
Island, and is so purified by the sea breezes, that this is one 
of the favorite si)ots on the Atlantic coast as a resort for 
visitors from all the West, who come even from Chicago to 
New York and Newport to 

" Sate them with kisses of the broad Atlantic." 

Our nearby resorts along the Jersey coast and on Long- 
Island are healthful and cool in mid-summer, beyond com- 
parison, and capacious enough for hundreds of thousands. 
By our new aqueduct our water supply from the pure 
mountain springs in the Highlands of the Hudson will be 
quadrupled, and for a " refrigerator" we have on one side 
three thousand miles of the great ocean, and on the other 
the mountain breezes of the whole range of the Alleghanies 
and Catskills. 

Even without a Fair, the moment a foreigner who comes 
here on a visit starts inland to see the country, Chicago as 
" the centre of our great inland commerce " will be the first 
attraction. 

New York will not be behindhand in financial support. 
Its leaders in finance are many of them men retired from 
active business, who move cautiously and surely. 

The City authorities have proposed to expend fifteen 
millions in laud and buildings. The proposal for a popular 
subscription, started at five millions, was so warmly wel- 
comed that it is assured as soon as the Finance Committee 



42 



announce the terms on whicli it will be received. This is a 
sound basis, and further financial aid is in readiness. 

The World's Fair will be held in New York, near Xew 
England, the seat of ingenuity and the birthplace of 
mechanical inventions, which have benefitted the whole 
world, lightened the burdens of the laboring classes and 
increased their earnings one-hundredfold. These have 
proved to these United States what Columbus trusted the 
discovery of the New World would be to Spain — "a source 
of much wealth." As your illustrious Burnside said of his 
men, that he could "always rely upon them,"' so we now 
say of Rhode Island. 

If we were to have a State Fair and we wished to make it 
a great success would we locate it at Albany, because it was 
our Capital, or locate it where the gTeatest number could 
most conveniently attend and be most comfortably shel- 
tered and fed? Did England locate her International Fair 
at great Birmingham or at London ? At which place 
would it have been the greatest financial benefit to her 
whole country i The Exposition at Vienna was a dismal 
failure because it was too far inland. 

Starting from the Battery on a level but little above the 
tide, as one goes up town in K'ew York higher levels are 
reached, one above the other — Murray Hill, Lenox Hill, 
the heights in Central Park and the cliffs of Riverside. 
This progressive ascent attains a summit at Bloomingdale 
Heights, seven miles from the Battery, and 150 feet high. 
This is the Citadel of the city, for above it the hOl falls 
abruptly, nearly to the river level in Manhattan Yalley. 
Here was fought the decisive battle of Harlem in the War 
of the Revolution. 

The region west of the Central Park is not surpassed in 
natural beauty by any suburb of any city, and it is filling 
with the finest residences, so that even families from 
Chicago come to dwell there and to enjoy life, for its pure 
and sootless atmosphere. Its gTowth and beauiy are the 



43 



marvel of New York. It is a high plateau ascending- 
gradually to this summit of Bloomingdale Heights, which 
we have chosen as the best we have for the site of the 
Exposition. Its adaptation, as well as its grand beauty, 
are unsurpassed. This hill commands a view of the broad 
Hudson, where there is room for the anchorage and parade 
of the grand fleets of Spain, and of all the| other nations 
which, it has been already announced, will visit^us. 

When the Columbus tower shall be erected upon it, the 
visitor will scan the broad Atlantic for a quadrant of the 
horizon, the ocean that Columbus traversed, yet we do not 
claim that he can see the track of his " Caravel." In our 
broad sheltered harbors a thousand or more yachts will 
ride in readiness for the great "International yacht race 
for the 'Columbus Cup' — a challenge to the world.'' 

When the people of Rochester showed Daniel Webster 
the falls of the Genesee he told them that no people who 
had a water-fall 150 feet high ever lost their liberties ; nor 
can we when we have this hill for a site ever lose the fair ; 
nor can any man, when he stands upon it, vote against it. 

The strangers who come from the distant cities of the 
world ; one who at home stands at the Castle at Edinburgh 
— the Miniata at Florence — the Church of San Martino at 
Naples — the Pincian Hill at Rome — or the terraced palaces 
behind Genoa, will all unite in saying that this hill is the 
worthy Acropolis of a metrojiolitan city; while to the dwel- 
lers in the lowlands about London, or Paris, or Berlin, or 
to those who live on the beautiful Western prairies, it will 
be a revelation. 

The Hudson River at its feet was the inspiration of the 
sweetest poets and writers of our land, of Irving, Bryant, 
Halleck, Drake and Poe, and through them its beauties 
have found international fame. They unite with Halleck in 

" The esteem 
" We bear this fairy city of the heart." 

Columbus was the precursor of the bold sailors who cir- 
cumnavigated the world. What he and his Spanish fol- 



44 



lowers did was for Spain, for the cross and for gold ; and 
for centuries his newly discovered land belonged to Spain. 
England and Holland did the same thing for freedom, for 
trade and for dominion. From the European point of view, 
the honor of the discovery of the New World belonged to the 
Old, as to them belonged the daring and the perils of their 
explorations and settlements, and this honor they will not 
forego. From the North Sea to the Mediterranean, they count 
it as their glory, from which we, their sons, are receiving the 
material benefits. They will come here to receive their 
reward in honor, as they see ours in prosperity. Even the 
poor Italian in the streets will be treated, in that great day, 
"with brotherly reverence. This sentiment is not to be dis- 
regarded. It is the spirit in which the internationaliTy of 
the fair subsists. Hence will start the blessings which will 
again circumnavigate the globe for the good of all nations, 
and bind us anew as one in heart, as Columbus made the 
union of men possible over the face of the unknown and 
undiscovered earth. 

Were Columbus himself once more alive and permitted 
to-day, after four hundred years, to visit one only of the great 
cities of the Western Hemisphere, which one would he be 
most desirous of seeing ? Would it not be the city of the 
greatest population, the greatest wealth, the greatest 
manufacturing, commercial and shipping centre ? This is 
true of everyone else. A location for this Exposition 
of 1892 must be selected which is most accessible to and 
most representative of all the Americas, North, Central and 
South. 

There are many millions of our Western prairie citizens 
who have never seen a mountain or the Atlantic Ocean, and 
to them, as to us, the sight and inspection of even one 
of our gTeat ocean steamers is a marvel in itself. 

Columbus found what he thought to be the "far 
Cathay." That is the nearest approach he made to 
Chicago. He never reached it, for his description does not 
fit. 



45 



He says : "I found only a few hamlets, with the inhabi- 
" tants of which I could not hold conversation, because 
" they all immediately fled." Then he describes his trade 
with them. " Whether it be something of value, or of 
" little worth, that is offered to them, they are satisfied. 
" They even took bits of the broken hoops of the wine 
" barrels and gave, like fools, all they possessed, in 
" exchange, inasmuch that I thought it was wrong and for- 
" bade it." Certainly this was not Chicago. 

AVitness how he closes his narrative of the discovery, 
which is to be celebrated not by us but by the whole world. 
This is the spirit to which New York most heartily 
responds. 

" But our Redeemer hath granted this victory to our 
' illustrious King and Queen and their kingdoms, which 
' have acquired great fame by an event of such high 
' importance in which all Christendom ought to rejoice and 
' which it ought to celebrate with great festivals, and the 
' offering of solemn thanks to the Holy Trinity, with 
'many solemn prayers, both for the great exaltation 
' which may accrue to them in turning so many nations to 
' our holy faith, and also for the temporal benefits wliich 
' will bring great refreshment and gain, not only to Spain, 
' but to all Christians. Thus briefly in accordance with 
' the events." 



This stamps its internationality. 



Yours very respectfully, 

W. E. D. Stokes, 

Secretary. 



46 

CtOveenoe Ladd iDresided at the meeting on the 15th 
October. 

The foregoing letter of Mr. Stokes was read as the argu- 
ment for New York. Hon. Thomas B. Bryan, of Chicago, 
in an eloquent and forcible address, presented the claims of 
Chicago ; Alexander D. Anderson those of Washington. 

The following telegrams from Mayor G-rant and ex-Sena- 
tor Piatt were read : 

New Yoek, October 16. 

His Excellency, G-ovEEisroR Ladd : 

f The people of New York desire that the World's Fair of 
1892 should be held in their City, and hope that the people 
in your State will aid them in securing it. 

Hugh J. Geant. 

New Yoek, October 15. 
GOVEENOE Ladd': 

New York looks to Rhode Island for her support and 
assistance in making the International Exposition of 1892, 
in New York City, a grand success. Our secretary, Mr. 
Stokes, has sent you a communication. 

Thomas C. Platt. 

J. N. Staekweathee, President of the Board of Trade, 
then oifered the following, which was adopted : 

Hesolved, That an Exposition in 1892, in honor of the 
400th anniversary of the discovery of America, is the best 
manner in which to celebrate so important an historical 
event. 

Resolved, That the success of such an Exhibition must 
depend upon its exhibits and its patronage. 

Resolved, That New York City, being the largest manu- 
facturing City in America, is the centre of all the various 
industries whose exhibits would contribute to make an 
exposition inviting. 



47 

Resolved, That the agricultural and mining exhibits 
being more novel to Eastern people, would be a greater 
attraction in New York City than anywhere else, alike 
from the interest capital would take in it and the larger 
number of people. 

Resolved, That New York City is the centre of a large 
population which can visit the Fair and return in one day, 
thus insuring a success. 

Resolved, That New York City from its harbor and com- 
merce is known all over the world as is no other American 
City. 

Resolved, That Rhode Island, while fully cognizant of 
the claims of Chicago and Washington, believes that the 
City of New York has the most commanding advantages 
for success. 

Resolved, That Rhode Island casts her vote for New 
York for first choice and Chicago for second choice, and 
will assist, as far as lies in her power, to make the Exposi- 
tion worthy the event wherever held. 

Resolved, That his Excellency the Governor be requested 
to transmit copies of these resolutions to the President of 
the United States and members of the Cabinet, the Presi- 
dent of the Senate, the Speaker of the House, the Gfover- 
nors of the various States and Territories, the Mayors of 
the principal cities and the presidents of all commercial 
bodies. 



"A great mass meeting of Rhode Island citizens was 
"held in the Capitol of that State yesterday. New York 
" was enthusiastically endorsed as the site for the Exposi- 
"tion of 1892. 

- "If Providence be with us, who can be against us?" — 
New York Herald, Oct. 16, 1889. 



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